YouTube

The Verge’s final Halloween recommendation list showcases a mix of creepy, disturbing, and surreal YouTube videos, aiming to set a spooky mood for the season. Among the selections is a 1983 short film by Cecelia Condit, which remained obscure until it was uploaded to YouTube more than thirty years after its creation. The upload sparked renewed interest, leading the film to circulate on Reddit and attract a new generation of viewers. The article highlights how older, niche horror content can be revived through modern platforms, offering fans fresh material that blends classic themes with contemporary online culture. By spotlighting this rediscovered film, The Verge underscores the enduring appeal of underground horror and the role of digital communities in preserving and promoting forgotten works.

The Verge’s latest spooky‑season roundup spotlights a handful of unsettling YouTube videos, ranging from surreal art‑house shorts to cosmic horror and classic viral clips. Among the picks is a 1983 short by Cecelia Condit that only found a wide audience after being uploaded to YouTube and later shared on Reddit. The article notes how the platform’s algorithm and community sharing can resurrect obscure works, giving them new life decades after their creation. Readers are invited to explore the curated list to get into the Halloween spirit, with each clip offering a distinct flavor of dread. The piece underscores the role of modern media hubs in preserving and reintroducing niche horror to contemporary audiences.

Curry Barker, the director behind the hit horror film Obsession, has just released a new short horror film titled “Mama Bear” on YouTube. The five‑minute clip, which Barker wrote, directed and edited, is described as unnerving and slightly graphic, offering a quick scare for viewers ahead of the upcoming Halloween weekend. It appears on his “that’s a bad idea” channel, where the description thanks Windows for sponsoring the short. Barker was also featured in an Instagram video earlier this week, promoting the release. The short’s brief runtime and straightforward production make it an accessible addition to the horror community’s seasonal content. Fans of Barker’s work can now stream the new piece directly on YouTube without a subscription or purchase.

In a statement to The Verge, YouTube confirmed it is not testing a feature that would hide the dislike button from viewers. Instead, the platform is rolling out a new interface for creators on their uploaded videos, in which the dislike button will be relocated to the three‑dot menu. The change does not alter how viewers see or use the dislike function; it simply reorganizes the creator’s dashboard. The move is part of YouTube’s ongoing effort to streamline creator tools while maintaining public visibility of dislike metrics. Creators will now access dislike counts through the new UI, potentially affecting how they interpret audience sentiment. Viewers will continue to see the dislike button alongside likes as before.

Google has begun tagging music tracks on YouTube Music that were produced with generative AI tools. The new label, similar to the one added to AI‑generated videos earlier this year, appears in the app and on the website. The company says it is not banning AI music, but wants to give listeners transparency about how a song was created. In a blog post, Google noted that generative AI opens new ways for artists to create, experiment, and share music, while acknowledging that many users want to know whether a track was made with AI. The rollout is currently in progress.

Maria Ressa, co-founder and CEO of Rappler, will join WNYC's Brian Lehrer for a live conversation on October 15 at The Greene Space in Lower Manhattan. The event, part of New York Public Radio's 'Democracy Dialogues' series, will focus on understanding, defending, and rebuilding democracy in the age of AI. The conversation will be live-streamed on various platforms, including wnyc. org, Rappler. com, C-SPAN, and YouTube.

NASA astronauts Jessica Watkins and Luke Delaney will answer prerecorded STEM questions from Florida students during a live call from the International Space Station on Friday, Oct. 16 at 12 p. m. EDT. The event, hosted by Sally Ride Elementary School in Orlando, will stream on NASA’s Learn With NASA YouTube channel and is open to K‑12 students and the community. The call is part of NASA’s effort to deepen understanding of space exploration and raise awareness of STEM careers. Media wishing to cover the event must RSVP by Oct. 15. The ISS has supported continuous human presence and scientific breakthroughs for over 25 years, laying the groundwork for Artemis and future Mars missions.

YouTube is implementing a new label for tracks that have been altered or fully generated using artificial intelligence (AI). This label will be applied to songs that use generative models to create composition and vocals. The label is part of YouTube's existing process for applying AI labels to videos. Music partners who upload their songs are required to disclose the use of generative AI, and if there is no disclosure, YouTube may use other signals to determine if a song is AI-generated. The label is rolling out starting today.

Google’s first Chromebook prototype, dubbed the Cr‑48, never carried a product name or flashy design. Instead, it served as a technical proof‑of‑concept for a new computing vision. In a recent episode of the podcast “Version History,” The Verge’s Nilay Patel, YouTube tech reviewer Marques Brownlee, and host David Pierce unpack the Cr‑48’s role in the birth of ChromeOS and the Chromebook line. They examine how the prototype’s minimalism and focus on cloud‑based computing laid the groundwork for a hardware strategy that would later dominate school technology. The discussion also questions whether Google’s early hardware approach was the right path for the company’s long‑term strategy.

Rappler has introduced Muni, a free chat‑room platform inside its app that prioritizes factual information over virality. The service offers both public and private rooms, with features such as message pinning, threading, notifications, and the ability to embed YouTube videos. Users can request that specific Rappler stories be automatically delivered to their rooms, and the chat space can be embedded on a community’s own website, as seen with Daily Guardian and SunStar Cebu. Target audiences include newsrooms, advocacy groups, hobby clubs, and civil‑society organizations that value high‑quality information and streamlined communication. Interested groups can email community@rappler. com to schedule an exploratory meeting.

NASA will stream live coverage of the SpaceX Crew‑13 mission, scheduled to lift off at 11:10 a. m. EDT on Oct. 1 from Cape Canaveral’s Space Launch Complex 40. The four‑member crew—NASA astronauts Jessica Watkins and Luke Delaney, Canadian Space Agency astronaut Joshua Kutryk, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Sergey Teteryatnikov—will travel aboard a SpaceX Dragon capsule to the International Space Station for a long‑duration science mission. The 7‑hour, 50‑minute transit will be the fastest U. S. spacecraft to dock with the ISS, targeting the Harmony module’s forward port at 7 p. m. NASA’s coverage includes pre‑launch, launch, and docking streams on NASA+, YouTube, and social media, plus audio‑only updates and a virtual guest program for the public. Post‑launch, a news conference will discuss the mission’s status and the crew’s handover with Crew‑12.